John Kavanagh: ‘UFC 247 was a clear victory for Jon Jones.’

Conor McGregor’s coach John Kavanagh said on his social media that he felt Jon Jones clearly deserved to win the decision against Dominick Reyes at UFC 247.

In one of the most controversial title fight decisions in recent years, Jones edged out a narrow unanimous decision victory by scores of 48-47, 48-47 and 49-46. It was an extremely close fight that was fought tooth-and-nail by two of the best light heavyweights in the world, but most including UFC president Dana White seemed to side with Reyes earning the decision. The judges, however, awarded Jones the win, something which Kavanagh agrees with.

The head trainer at Straight Blast Gym in Ireland, Kavanagh took to his Twitter following UFC 247 to say that he felt Jones deserved to get the judges’ decision over Reyes. However, Kavanagh admitted that his scoring criteria are different than what it says in the rulebooks, leading several fans in the comments to question his scorecard.

I know I'm wrong to do what I do because I'm not a trained judge but I will always weight later rounds more heavily than earlier ones. I ask myself who would survive a no time/rule encounter. Because of that it was a clear @JonnyBones victory for me. https://t.co/OLSelSU4QG

“I know I’m wrong to do what I do because I’m not a trained judge but I will always weight later rounds more heavily than earlier ones. I ask myself who would survive a no time/rule encounter. Because of that it was a clear @JonnyBones victory for me.”

That Kavanagh says it was a clear Jones victory is surprising since most felt it was closed. Regardless of whether you thought Reyes or Jones deserved to win the fight, it was clearly a very competitive bout and the decision would have been controversial either way. Had Reyes defeated Jones then you would have had plenty of people arguing it was a robbery the other way around. But Jones ended up being the one who got his hand raised, and now people are saying it was a robbery against Reyes instead.

Do you agree with John Kavanagh that Jon Jones deserved to win the decision over Dominick Reyes?